Thursday, April 21, 2011

Science v Technology Definitions

So this issue has been bothering me for a long time: the difference between Science and Technology. Many people think they understand the difference, but I have been seeing more and more cases of confusion between the two words. So here's the two definitions:

Science - The intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment

Technology- The application of scientific knowledge for practical purposes.

So pretty simple, science is the study of learning about our world (and space) through observation and experimentation. Technology is using science. So technology can be gizmos and gadgets like we usually think, but it can also be just using science in our everyday life. Identifying plants from scientific research is technology. Though it is not an incredibly advanced item, it is still part of what technology is. Now that, that's cleared up, I think it's important to understand how both are practical in our everyday life. Many could say that we never actually use science, itself , but we use the information from it in all of our technology. Without science we could not advance in society, but the actual information we acquire from scientific study is essential.

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